The Jungle Bizarre

I take really long bike trips on the roads less traveled here. Angkor Chum district still has undiscovered parts of it, and I never really quite know what it is that I will find there. The other day, I found the long lost back way into the neighboring Kralanh district. It was horribly rutted, with some of the trenches at least a foot or two deep. The best way to get through was to just find the edges of the road and ride on the top part of the dirt bank that was maybe five inches wide. It seemed that the only way to get through was by bicycle, or by remork with big tires and an axle high off the ground. I passed by one on my way back, and even a machine like this was struggling. After getting through this mess and fording two small rivers, I exited the rice fields for the shade of jungle. A small farming settlement was set up in between the leaves of the palm and banana trees, intermixed with bamboo. There was also a cell phone tower.

I stopped at the crossroads where the road leads down to the main Kralanh town. People occupied the two food and drink shops nearby, and as I stopped some of them approached to take a look at the curious white thing that had just come out of the jungle on a shiny bicycle. A man wearing a kromah and having the skin of a Tamil was the first to speak to me. He had an eagle tattooed across his chest to ward off evil spirits, and his teeth were the color of sugarcane. I asked him where I was, and said that it was the first village in Kralanh town when you come across from Angkor Chum. We went through the usual banter of where I had come from and what I was doing in Cambodia.

There was a sudden commotion at one of the drink shops. Inside one of the wooden huts a boy of sixteen or so was slumped over a large plastic jug, cup in hand. He had had too much of the local brew. His friends tried to move him, but he fell over completely into the mud below. His black t-shirt and ripped jeans were suddenly dirty with mud, which stains your clothes and never comes out no matter how hard you soap scrub them. A friend jumped down from the hut and helped the boy. A grandmother in a loose shirt, sampot, and shaved head appeared out of nowhere to give the boys a good talking to. The friend picked the boy up, but he crumpled like paper and fell down again. He was finally forced to take the arms, sling them over his shoulders, and carry him like a little girl carries a rag doll in the playground. By this point, a crowd had gathered. You could hear their squawking all the way down the road. I asked the tattooed man if the boy was going to be alright. He said he would be just fine, he just had too much to drink.

It was four in the afternoon.